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A longtime rural resident, I use my 60 plus years of life learning to opinionate here and elsewhere on the “interweb” on everything from politics to environmental issues. A believer in reasonable discourse rather than unhelpful attacks I try to give positive input to the blogesphere, so feel free to comment upon rural issues or anything else posted here. But don’t be surprised if you comments get zapped if you are not polite in your replys.

Tuesday, April 5, 2016

Teaching the Teachers

It appears that Elementary School Teachers in Ontario, who have
graduated High School and gone on to further education and obtained
their Teaching Certificate, need further education in order to teach
BASIC math to elementary age kids. It also seems that schools need to
be forced to teach this basic skill with any consistency with many
schools spending less that an hour covering math skills.

Are we saying that a teacher who has their certificate does NOT
have the skills and knowledge necessary to teach basic math and we
need more 'specialist' teachers? That we need to give said teachers
up to five additional days of math professional development a year at
a cost of $60 million in order that they can do so?

Some teachers questioned which subjects they will have to cut
to find 60 minutes for math, but many already spend that much time on
math, suggested Poleen Grewal, superintendent of curriculum and
instruction for the Peel District School Board, which is in the
second year of a big push on math improvement.
“You’d actually have to spend that much time if you’re
engaging in problem-solving; a lot of schools actually spend two 40-
to 50-minute periods on math, so I don’t think 60 minutes is a
stretch.”

The president of the Elementary
Teachers’ Federation of Ontario questioned the ongoing focus on
literacy and numeracy......... whilst other subjects are no doubt
also important perhaps he can explain how you can write reports or
indeed understand other subjects like science or geography without
these basic skills.

Let us ensure that our kids AND the
teachers have a good grasp of the basic skills of Math and English
before proceeding to other areas of interest.

No comments:

The Rant

I am a Canadian by choice not chance.
I am a country boy not a city slicker.
I have a dog not a doorbell, a collie not a rottweiler, a friend not a pet.
I walk in the woods not the streets.
I have a truck not a car, a barn not a garage, a septic system not a sewer.
I live on a gravel road not a paved road.
I have dial up not high speed, a mailbox not a letterbox, a yard light not a street light.
I shoot photo’s not trophies.
I am old not young, married not single, poor not rich, over taxed not over sexed.
I heat with wood not gas,
I respect my neighbors not numb-sculls, police not politicians , hikers not hunters.
I am a RURAL Canadian.